From Structure to Integration: The Trajectory of the Material Constitution

Abstract

This chapter presents a brief reconstruction of the main contributions to the notion of the material constitution before the publication of the essential work by Costantino Mortati. In particular, the chapter focuses on two traditions: the materialist understanding of the notion as seminally provided by Ferdinand Lasalle and, later on in a famous analysis of the US constitution by Charles Beard. The second tradition is legal institutionalism and two authors (among many) are chosen as the most representative: Smend and Heller. According to this approach, the material constitution becomes an integration device. this understanding will prove to be prominent in the following uses of the notion of the material constitution.

Keywords: Material Constitution; Lassalle; Legal Institutionalism; Constitution as Integration